Katakoi
by hikachu
Summary: Doumeki can only watch and wait for the day when the witch will finally die once and for all and Watanuki will start breathing again.


Doumeki eats and – sometimes – drinks even more than Yuuko. Watanuki is secretely, unconsciously grateful for this, not because he lets himself see Doumeki as some sort of replacement, but because it means being busy, and being busy is a good, good thing for him, now.

Watanuki, of course, never says any of this aloud, but Doumeki can read his thoughts easily. After all, they're _there_, clearly written in his posture and the way he moves his hands when he grabs plastic bags full of vegetables from his; the thoughts and the melancholy, the longing for something long gone, are all there in the corner of his placid mouth. Doumeki still remembers when that face used to be like the sea: eternally changing, never the same… Nowadays it's like a lake, and the man doesn't know what worries him more: the unexpressive surface or the mud at the bottom, all that's rotting, apparently forgotten, beneath that parody of ataraxy.

He feels sorry for Kunogi because it's not fair that she had to give up so much; he knows that she doesn't call often because otherwise the nostalgia and the sadness would overwhelm both herself and her most precious person. Doumeki knows she's a good girl, a wise girl. Doumeki knows her voice is like a ray of sunshine in Watanuki's gray days, because it's only when they're talking, picturing each other's face while holding the receiver tightly, that he can see a glimpse of the boy who would laugh and flail and yell at him so easily.

Where did that boy go? It's been ten years, and the memory of him is already fading. Watanuki chose to stop his own time forever, until the day he will disappear (because nothing and no one can be eternal), and yet he looks so much older than Doumeki himself. He has gotten stronger thanks to the people he has met, the extraordinary things he has witnessed, but he's not as strong as the witch was: he can't bring himself to imitate her happy-go-lucky attitude too, but that's no surprise after all, because Yuuko was a woman, and women can be frighteningly rational – even when they act like brainless fools or are in despair.

Sometimes Watanuki spaces out, eyes fixed on a random spot of the tatami mat, as if he's expecting something to be there and is surprised to find only empty air in its place. Doumeki knows what's missing: Yuuko's long limbs lying there, sprawled without grace and yet so elegant; her hair like a messy net of black silk; her eyes closed as she sleeps (or pretends to). She was always more like a spoiled, oversized cat than a responsible adult. The shop is a lot quieter without her barking orders or complaining about a headache or laughing too loudly. The calm is eerie; even now, it still doesn't feel right.

Even back then (when silence in the shop was a rare treat), Doumeki could vaguely understand that everything she did, everything she ordered Watanuki to do, was for Watanuki's own sake, to teach him how to be happier, to live better (everyone in his family – and even the neighbors – used to say that he was surprisingly mature and smart, for a kid his age, after all). And while he didn't dislike her, Doumeki could never bring himself to like the witch either, because he knew that her lessons were double-edged swords, that they could easily hurt Watanuki if he didn't succeed and find their hidden meaning. He also knew that it was only right for things to work that way, but even then he cared too much for Watanuki, and fondness – it's a very well known fact – makes you more selfish and less rational, and so, even if he understood it, he couldn't accept the idea that the possibility of Watanuki getting hurt was totally fair, because seer or not, he was just human, like everyone else.

This Watanuki who can't and doesn't want to grow seems to have forgotten everything about those days, about what Yuuko really wanted for him, as he has never mourned her (mourning would mean eventually moving on), preferring instead to retire into a cocoon of stagnant air and ribbons of smoke, endlessly waiting for her and forcing himself to live each day as though as he too had died on that day. Doumeki can understand this reaction too, as wrong as it feels and is, because yes, even now, Watanuki is still only a human. He wonders if the witch knew that her plan could backfire like this, but he doesn't blame her for it because, in the end, she too was human, and she did her best even if she couldn't be sure that she would succeed – like everyone else.

Doumeki can't make him smile like Kunogi or Tsuyuri do (nowadays, actually, he can't even really anger him like he used to): he is useful and he is necessary to Watanuki who has work to do and can't go out, but he isn't quite as precious as them to him.

He can only watch as the other tries to find the witch in rooms that are empty and waits for her voice to tell him 'welcome back!' even if he can't leave the shop anymore. Doumeki can only watch and wait for the day when the witch will finally die once and for all and Watanuki will start breathing again.


End file.
